Now I know that hearing that from me must surely come as a surprise, because year after year I’ve stood at this very podium and slammed the UN for its obsessive bias against Israel. And the UN deserved every scathing word – for the disgrace of the General Assembly that last year passed 20 resolutions against the democratic State of Israel and a grand total of three resolutions against all the other countries on the planet.

Israel – twenty; rest of the world – three.

And what about the joke called the UN Human Rights Council, which each year condemns Israel more than all the countries of the world combined. As women are being systematically raped, murdered, sold into slavery across the world, which is the only country that the UN’s Commission on Women chose to condemn this year? Yep, you guessed it – Israel. Israel. Israel where women fly fighter jets, lead major corporations, head universities, preside – twice – over the Supreme Court, and have served as Speaker of the Knesset and Prime Minister.

And this circus continues at UNESCO. UNESCO, the UN body charged with preserving world heritage. Now, this is hard to believe but UNESCO just denied the 4,000 year connection between the Jewish people and its holiest site, the Temple Mount. That’s just as absurd as denying the connection between the Great Wall of China and China. Ladies and Gentlemen, The UN, begun as a moral force, has become a moral farce. So when it comes to Israel at the UN, you’d probably think nothing will ever change, right? Well think again. You see, everything will change and a lot sooner than you think. The change will happen in this hall, because back home, your governments are rapidly changing their attitudes towards Israel. And sooner or later, that’s going to change the way you vote on Israel at the UN.

More and more nations in Asia, in Africa, in Latin America, more and more nations see Israel as a potent partner – a partner in fighting the terrorism of today, a partner in developing the technology of tomorrow.

Today Israel has diplomatic relations with over 160 countries. That’s nearly double the number that we had when I served here as Israel’s ambassador some 30 years ago. And those ties are getting broader and deeper every day. World leaders increasingly appreciate that Israel is a powerful country with one of the best intelligence services on earth. Because of our unmatched experience and proven capabilities in fighting terrorism, many of your governments seek our help in keeping your countries safe. Many also seek to benefit from Israel’s ingenuity in agriculture, in health, in water, in cyber and in the fusion of big data, connectivity and artificial intelligence – that fusion that is changing our world in every way.

You might consider this: Israel leads the world in recycling wastewater. We recycle about 90% of our wastewater. Now, how remarkable is that? Well, given that the next country on the list only recycles about 20% of its wastewater, Israel is a global water power. So if you have a thirsty world, and we do, there’s no better ally than Israel.

How about cybersecurity? That’s an issue that affects everyone. Israel accounts for one-tenth of one percent of the world’s population, yet last year we attracted some 20% of the global private investment in cybersecurity. I want you to digest that number. In cyber, Israel is punching a whopping 200 times above its weight. So Israel is also a global cyber power. If hackers are targeting your banks, your planes, your power grids and just about everything else, Israel can offer indispensable help.

Governments are changing their attitudes towards Israel because they know that Israel can help them protect their peoples, can help them feed them, can help them better their lives. This summer I had an unbelievable opportunity to see this change so vividly during an unforgettable visit to four African countries. This is the first visit to Africa by an Israeli prime minister in decades. Later today, I’ll be meeting with leaders from 17 African countries. We’ll discuss how Israeli technology can help them in their efforts to transform their countries. In Africa, things are changing. In China, India, Russia, Japan, attitudes towards Israel have changed as well. These powerful nations know that, despite Israel’s small size, it can make a big difference in many, many areas that are important to them.

But now I’m going to surprise you even more. You see, the biggest
change in attitudes towards Israel is taking place elsewhere. It’s
taking place in the Arab world. Our peace treaties with Egypt and
Jordan continue to be anchors of stability in the volatile Middle
East. But I have to tell you this: For the first time in my lifetime,
many other states in the region recognize that Israel is not their
enemy. They recognize that Israel is their ally. Our common enemies
are Iran and ISIS. Our common goals are security, prosperity and
peace. I believe that in the years ahead we will work together to
achieve these goals, work together openly.

So Israel’s diplomatic relations are undergoing nothing less than a
revolution. But in this revolution, we never forget that our most
cherished alliance, our deepest friendship is with the United States
of America, the most powerful and the most generous nation on earth.
Our unbreakable bond with the United States of America transcends
parties and politics. It reflects, above all else, the overwhelming
support for Israel among the American people, support which is at
record highs and for which we are deeply grateful.

The United Nations denounces Israel; the United States supports
Israel. And a central pillar of that defense has been America’s
consistent support for Israel at the UN. I appreciate President
Obama’s commitment to that longstanding US policy. In fact, the only
time that the United States cast a UN Security Council veto during the
Obama presidency was against an anti-Israel resolution in 2011. As
President Obama rightly declared at this podium, peace will not come
from statements and resolutions at the United Nations.

I believe the day is not far off when Israel will be able to rely on
many, many countries to stand with us at the UN. Slowly but surely,
the days when UN ambassadors reflexively condemn Israel, those days
are coming to an end.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Today’s automatic majority against Israel at the
UN reminds me of the story, the incredible story of Hiroo Onada. Hiroo
was a Japanese soldier who was sent to the Philippines in 1944. He
lived in the jungle. He scavenged for food. He evaded capture.
Eventually he surrendered, but that didn’t happen until 1974, some 30
years after World War II ended. For decades, Hiroo refused to believe
the war was over. As Hiroo was hiding in the jungle, Japanese tourists
were swimming in pools in American luxury hotels in nearby Manila.
Finally, mercifully, Hiroo’s former commanding officer was sent to
persuade him to come out of hiding. Only then did Hiroo lay down his
arms.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Distinguished delegates from so many lands, I
have one message for you today: Lay down your arms. The war against
Israel at the UN is over. Perhaps some of you don’t know it yet, but I
am confident that one day in the not too distant future you will also
get the message from your president or from your prime minister
informing you that the war against Israel at the United Nations has
ended. Yes, I know, there might be a storm before the calm. I know
there is talk about ganging up on Israel at the UN later this year.
Given its history of hostility towards Israel, does anyone really
believe that Israel will let the UN determine our security and our
vital national interests? We will not accept any attempt by the UN to
dictate terms to Israel. The road to peace runs through Jerusalem and
Ramallah, not through New York. But regardless of what happens in the
months ahead, I have total confidence that in the years ahead the
revolution in Israel’s standing among the nations will finally
penetrate this hall of nations. I have so much confidence, in fact,
that I predict that a decade from now an Israeli prime minister will
stand right here where I am standing and actually applaud the UN. But
I want to ask you: Why do we have to wait a decade? Why keep vilifying
Israel? Perhaps because some of you don’t appreciate that the
obsessive bias against Israel is not just a problem for my country,
it’s a problem for your countries too. Because if the UN spends so
much time condemning the only liberal democracy in the Middle East, it
has far less time to address war, disease, poverty, climate change and
all the other serious problems that plague the planet.

Are the half million slaughtered Syrians helped by your condemnation
of Israel? The same Israel that has treated thousands of injured
Syrians in our hospitals, including a field hospital that I built
right along the Golan Heights border with Syria. Are the gays hanging
from cranes in Iran helped by your denigration of Israel? That same
Israel where gays march proudly in our streets and serve in our
parliament, including I’m proud to say in my own Likud party. Are the
starving children in North Korea’s brutal tyranny, are they helped by
your demonization of Israel? Israel, whose agricultural knowhow is
feeding the hungry throughout the developing world? The sooner the
UN’s obsession with Israel ends, the better. The better for Israel,
the better for your countries, the better for the UN itself.

Ladies and Gentlemen, If UN habits die hard, Palestinian habits die
even harder. President Abbas just attacked from this podium the
Balfour Declaration. He’s preparing a lawsuit against Britain for that
declaration from 1917. That’s almost 100 years ago – talk about being
stuck in the past. The Palestinians may just as well sue Iran for the
Cyrus Declaration, which enabled the Jews to rebuild our Temple in
Jerusalem 2,500 years ago. Come to think of it, why not a Palestinian
class action suit against Abraham for buying that plot of land in
Hebron where the fathers and mothers of the Jewish people were buried
4,000 years ago? You’re not laughing. It’s as absurd as that. To sue
the British government for the Balfour Declaration? Is he kidding? And
this is taken seriously here? President Abbas attacked the Balfour
Declaration because it recognized the right of the Jewish people to a
national home in the land of Israel. When the United Nations supported
the establishment of a Jewish state in 1947, it recognized our
historical and our moral rights in our homeland and to our homeland.
Yet today, nearly 70 years later, the Palestinians still refuse to
recognize those rights – not our right to a homeland, not our right to
a state, not our right to anything. And this remains the true core of
the conflict, the persistent Palestinian refusal to recognize the
Jewish state in any boundary. You see, this conflict is not about the
settlements. It never was.

The conflict raged for decades before there was a single settlement,
when Judea Samaria and Gaza were all in Arab hands. The West Bank and
Gaza were in Arab hands and they attacked us again and again and
again. And when we uprooted all 21 settlements in Gaza and withdrew
from every last inch of Gaza, we didn’t get peace from Gaza – we got
thousands of rockets fired at us from Gaza. This conflict rages
because for the Palestinians, the real settlements they’re after are
Haifa, Jaffa and Tel Aviv. Now mind you, the issue of settlements is a
real one and it can and must be resolved in final status negotiations.
But this conflict has never been about the settlements or about
establishing a Palestinian state. It’s always been about the existence
of a Jewish state, a Jewish state in any boundary.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Israel is ready, I am ready to negotiate all
final status issues but one thing I will never negotiate: Our right to
the one and only Jewish state.

Wow, sustained applause for the Prime Minister of Israel in the
General Assembly? The change may be coming sooner than I thought. Had
the Palestinians said yes to a Jewish state in 1947, there would have
been no war, no refugees and no conflict. And when the Palestinians
finally say yes to a Jewish state, we will be able to end this
conflict once and for all. Now here’s the tragedy, because, see, the
Palestinians are not only trapped in the past, their leaders are
poisoning the future. I want you to imagine a day in the life of a
13-year-old Palestinian boy, I’ll call him Ali. Ali wakes up before
school, he goes to practice with a soccer team named after Dalal
Mughrabi, a Palestinian terrorist responsible for the murder of a
busload of 37 Israelis. At school, Ali attends an event sponsored by
the Palestinian Ministry of Education honoring Baha Alyan, who last
year murdered three Israeli civilians. On his walk home, Ali looks up
at a towering statue erected just a few weeks ago by the Palestinian
Authority to honor Abu Sukar, who detonated a bomb in the center of
Jerusalem, killing 15 Israelis. When Ali gets home, he turns on the TV
and sees an interview with a senior Palestinian official, Jibril
Rajoub, who says that if he had a nuclear bomb, he’d detonate it over
Israel that very day. Ali then turns on the radio and he hears
President Abbas’s adviser, Sultan Abu al-Einein, urging Palestinians,
here’s a quote, “to slit the throats of Israelis wherever you find
them.” Ali checks his Facebook and he sees a recent post by President
Abbas’s Fatah Party calling the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the
Munich Olympics a “heroic act”. On YouTube, Ali watches a clip of
President Abbas himself saying, “We welcome every drop of blood
spilled in Jerusalem.” Direct quote. Over dinner, Ali asks his mother
what would happen if he killed a Jew and went to an Israeli prison?
Here’s what she tells him. She tells him he’d be paid thousands of
dollars each month by the Palestinian Authority. In fact, she tells
him, the more Jews he would kill, the more money he’d get. Oh, and
when he gets out of prison, Ali would be guaranteed a job with the
Palestinian Authority. Ladies and Gentlemen, All this is real. It
happens every day, all the time. Sadly, Ali represents hundreds of
thousands of Palestinian children who are indoctrinated with hate
every moment, every hour. This is child abuse. Imagine your child
undergoing this brainwashing. Imagine what it takes for a young boy or
girl to break free out of this culture of hate. Some do but far too
many don’t. How can any of us expect young Palestinians to support
peace when their leaders poison their minds against peace? We in
Israel don’t do this. We educate our children for peace. In fact, we
recently launched a pilot program, my government did, to make the
study of Arabic mandatory for Jewish children so that we can better
understand each other, so that we can live together side-by-side in
peace. Of course, like all societies Israel has fringe elements. But
it’s our response to those fringe elements, it’s our response to those
fringe elements that makes all the difference. Take the tragic case of
Ahmed Dawabsha. I’ll never forget visiting Ahmed in the hospital just
hours after he was attacked. A little boy, really a baby, he was badly
burned. Ahmed was the victim of a horrible terrorist act perpetrated
by Jews. He lay bandaged and unconscious as Israeli doctors worked
around the clock to save him. No words can bring comfort to this boy
or to his family. Still, as I stood by his bedside I told his uncle,
“This is not our people. This is not our way.” I then ordered
extraordinary measures to bring Ahmed’s assailants to justice and
today the Jewish citizens of Israel accused of attacking the Dawabsha
family are in jail awaiting trial. Now, for some, this story shows
that both sides have their extremists and both sides are equally
responsible for this seemingly endless conflict. But what Ahmed’s
story actually proves is the very opposite. It illustrates the
profound difference between our two societies, because while Israeli
leaders condemn terrorists, all terrorists, Arabs and Jews alike,
Palestinian leaders celebrate terrorists. While Israel jails the
handful of Jewish terrorists among us, the Palestinians pay thousands
of terrorists among them. So I call on President Abbas: you have a
choice to make. You can continue to stoke hatred as you did today or
you can finally confront hatred and work with me to establish peace
between our two peoples. Ladies and Gentlemen, I hear the buzz. I know
that many of you have given up on peace. But I want you to know – I
have not given up on peace. I remain committed to a vision of peace
based on two states for two peoples. I believe as never before that
changes taking place in the Arab world today offer a unique
opportunity to advance that peace. I commend President el-Sisi of
Egypt for his efforts to advance peace and stability in our region.
Israel welcomes the spirit of the Arab peace initiative and welcomes a
dialogue with Arab states to advance a broader peace. I believe that
for that broader peace to be fully achieved the Palestinians have to
be part of it. I’m ready to begin negotiations to achieve this today –
not tomorrow, not next week, today. President Abbas spoke here an hour
ago. Wouldn’t it be better if instead of speaking past each other we
were speaking to one another? President Abbas, instead of railing
against Israel at the United Nations in New York, I invite you to
speak to the Israeli people at the Knesset in Jerusalem. And I would
gladly come to speak to the Palestinian parliament in Ramallah. Ladies
and Gentlemen, While Israel seeks peace with all our neighbors, we
also know that peace has no greater enemy than the forces of militant
Islam. The bloody trail of this fanaticism runs through all the
continents represented here. It runs through Paris and Nice, Brussels
and Baghdad, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, Minnesota and New York, from
Sydney to San Bernardino. So many have suffered its savagery:
Christian and Jews, women and gays, Yazidis and Kurds and many, many
others. Yet the heaviest price, the heaviest price of all has been
paid by innocent Muslims. Hundreds of thousands unmercifully
slaughtered. Millions turned into desperate refugees, tens of millions
brutally subjugated. The defeat of militant Islam will thus be a
victory for all humanity, but it would especially be a victory for
those many Muslims who seek a life without fear, a life of peace, a
life of hope. But to defeat the forces of militant Islam, we must
fight them relentlessly. We must fight them in the real world. We must
fight them in the virtual world. We must dismantle their networks,
disrupt their funding, discredit their ideology. We can defeat them
and we will defeat them. Medievalism is no match for modernity. Hope
is stronger than hate, freedom mightier than fear. We can do this.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Israel fights this fateful battle against the
forces of militant Islam every day. We keep our borders safe from
ISIS, we prevent the smuggling of game-changing weapons to Hezbollah
in Lebanon, we thwart Palestinian terror attacks in Judea and Samaria,
the West Bank, and we deter missile attacks from Hamas-controlled
Gaza. That’s the same Hamas terror organization that cruelly,
unbelievably cruelly refuses to return three of our citizens and the
bodies of our fallen soldiers, Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin. Hadar
Goldin’s parents, Leah and Simcha Goldin, are here with us today. They
have one request – to bury their beloved son in Israel. All they ask
for is one simple thing – to be able to visit the grave of their
fallen son Hadar in Israel. Hamas refuses. They couldn’t care less. I
implore you to stand with them, with us, with all that’s decent in our
world against the inhumanity of Hamas – all that is indecent and
barbaric. Hamas breaks every humanitarian rule in the book, throw the
book at them. Ladies and Gentlemen, The greatest threat to my country,
to our region, and ultimately to our world remains the militant
Islamic regime of Iran. Iran openly seeks Israel’s annihilation. It
threatens countries across the Middle East, it sponsors terror
worldwide. This year, Iran has fired ballistic missiles in direct
defiance of Security Council Resolutions. It has expended its
aggression in Iraq, in Syria, in Yemen. Iran, the world’s foremost
sponsor of terrorism continued to build its global terror network.
That terror network now spans five continents. So my point to you is
this: The threat Iran poses to all of us is not behind us, it’s before
us. In the coming years, there must be a sustained and united effort
to push back against Iran’s aggression and Iran’s terror. With the
nuclear constraints on Iran one year closer to being removed, let me
be clear: Israel will not allow the terrorist regime in Iran to
develop nuclear weapons – not now, not in a decade, not ever.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I stand before you today at a time when Israel’s
former president, Shimon Peres, is fighting for his life. Shimon is
one of Israel’s founding fathers, one of its boldest statesmen, one of
its most respected leaders. I know you will all join me and join all
the people of Israel in wishing him refuah shlemah Shimon, a speedy
recovery. I’ve always admired Shimon’s boundless optimism, and like
him, I too am filled with hope. I am filled with hope because Israel
is capable of defending itself by itself against any threat. I am
filled with hope because the valor of our fighting men and women is
second to none. I am filled with hope because I know the forces of
civilization will ultimately triumph over the forces of terror. I am
filled with hope because in the age of innovation, Israel – the
innovation nation – is thriving as never before. I am filled with hope
because Israel works tirelessly to advance equality and opportunity
for all its citizens: Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze, everyone. And
I am filled with hope because despite all the naysayers, I believe
that in the years ahead, Israel will forge a lasting peace with all
our neighbors.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am hopeful about what Israel can accomplish
because I’ve seen what Israel has accomplished. In 1948, the year of
Israel’s independence, our population was 800,000. Our main export was
oranges. People said then we were too small, too weak, too isolated,
too demographically outnumbered to survive, let alone thrive. The
skeptics were wrong about Israel then; the skeptics are wrong about
Israel now.

Ladies and Gentlemen, The future belongs to those who innovate and
this is why the future belongs to countries like Israel. Israel wants
to be your partner in seizing that future, so I call on all of you:
Cooperate with Israel, embrace Israel, dream with Israel. Dream of the
future that we can build together, a future of breathtaking progress,
a future of security, prosperity and peace, a future of hope for all
humanity, a future where even at the UN, even in this hall, Israel
will finally, inevitably, take its rightful place among the nations.